


Lust, caution

by cassanah



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: F/M, Smut, There are no good guys in this story, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 20:28:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29477739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassanah/pseuds/cassanah
Summary: Xi’an can slit a man’s throat from a hundred feet away. An effortless flick of the wrist, that’s all it takes. Her kills are done with grace, with silence. Even the Mandalorian, maddeningly efficient as he is, can’t say the same.‘It’s the woman’s touch,’ she tells him. ‘That’s what you’re missing. I can help with that, if you’d like.’Whether he’d like it or not, he gives no indication. Not for lack of trying. It’s practically a team sport, getting a rise out of Mando.
Relationships: Din Djarin/Xi’an
Comments: 3
Kudos: 30





	Lust, caution

**Author's Note:**

> A glimpse into the Mandalorian's character years before he met Grogu, from the eyes of a contemporary...

Xi’an can slit a man’s throat from a hundred feet away. An effortless flick of the wrist, that’s all it takes. Her kills are done with grace, with silence. Even the Mandalorian, maddeningly efficient as he is, can’t say the same.

‘It’s the woman’s touch,’ she tells him. ‘That’s what you’re missing. I can help with that, if you’d like.’

Whether he’d like it or not, he gives no indication. Not for lack of trying. It’s practically a team sport, getting a rise out of Mando.

It’s a rough crew that she rides with these days, but it’s nothing compared to the cesspool she and her brother grew up in. Back then she’d been just a shrimp in a big pond full of sharks, her wits the sharpest thing she owned. Living by the edge of that blade had shaped her into what she was. She has no regrets. Maybe Ran’s right, and something’s fucked in her head, but there’s a certain joy to owning your lethality, to knowing that you’re good, that your name means something. So good she no longer has to worry much about stray hands and testosterone-fueled heckling, or hear the types of filthy propositions that make her want to twist her blade into a man’s gut, open him up like a fish.

Mando never says a word. Doesn’t even look at her unless it’s related to the job, his helmet never dipping down or following when she walks by, ass swaying for his benefit. Sometimes she wonders if he’s actually a droid. Or she would, if he didn’t hate droids so much. They’re the only things that do seem to get his blood up.

‘Why are you so obsessed with him? He’s a weirdo. He’s probably got a carburetor for a dick.’

Qin doesn’t get it. He’s also her little brother, so she tells him to shut up and mind his own fucking business. Besides, she’s not obsessed. He’s just a puzzle she hasn’t quite solved. She takes a cheerful crack at him now and then, when she’s bored. That’s all.

It’s just a matter of time. Everyone knows Xi’an always gets her man.

They end up alone together on a job, waiting in a cantina for some degenerate warlord and his posse to show up.

‘Drink up, Mando.’ She smiles, pounds back a shot of Johrian whiskey, eyes never leaving him. ‘Might make this tedious assignment go by faster.’ He stares back – or at least, she thinks he is. He’s holding his rifle blaster with still fingers. She’s seen that pose in loth cats stalking their prey.

‘No thanks.’

Her smile widens. ‘I should’ve known you’d be all work, no play. Here I thought we were going to have some fun tonight.’

‘You look like you’re having enough fun for both of us.’

She laughs, baring her teeth. This is already the longest conversation they’ve ever had.

‘Alright. So drinking’s not your speed. What do you like, Mando? Besides killing things?’

He doesn’t respond. Maybe Qin’s right, and there’s nothing else to him. Maybe that’s why he never takes vacation, never indulges in any visible vice.

She twirls her dagger idly on the table, scoring a small hole in its grimy surface. She feels restless, overheated in this dirty bar. ‘Come on, everyone’s got something. I won’t tell. Promise. What do you do when you ignore the rest of us and lock yourself in your little bunk? Don’t tell me you’re polishing your gun in there, all alone?’

He tilts his head, just slightly. ‘Is that what you think I’m doing? Polishing my gun?’

The way he says it, voice dropping a shade lower, makes her think that maybe the Mandalorian does play. She just needs to figure out a way to get under that helmet –

A big, ugly Zeltron has just walked into the bar, flanked by four henchmen bristling with guns and other toys. Xi’an’ leaps up, her favourite dagger in hand. Five against two, what a joke. Her blood’s singing already. ‘The man of the hour,’ she crows, ‘finally – some action!’

What she likes about fighting with Mando is how ruthless he is. There’s no hesitation when he kills. He’s not the most graceful fighter, but he’s got brute power and wiles. She watches him pound into the last unfortunate crony with just his hands, unfathomable fury in his movements. When it’s over, and they’re both covered with blood, he looks over, not at his fallen opponent, but straight at her.

Even with that mask on she recognizes it for what it is – bloodlust, the body confused as it whether it wants more violence or just a good fuck. She’s tasted it herself after a fight, coming down from the high of victory, her limbs singing with need, overcome by something heady and overpowering.

They don’t even make it back to base. In the safety of their getaway ship he lets her hands wander as far up as the rim of his helmet before he clamps down hard on her wrists, tears them away.

‘No.’

She pouts. ‘No?’

Instead he hoists her up against the metal innards of the ship. He keeps the helmet and nearly all the armour on the first time they fuck. It’s fast and rough, but she’s hot and wet and ready for him. He’s quiet compared to her, but she can feel him start to breathe harder and harder. She wraps her legs close around his waist and squeezes, feels him gasp and shudder against her.

When he comes, he holds her so tightly that later she finds bruises on her skin. It’s the first time she’s ever felt like they’re on even ground.

*

The mask stays on; the Mandalorian remains a cipher.

Except now she knows what the rest of him looks like underneath his armour, the exact shade and feel of his skin. She knows what parts of him are particularly sensitive, learns what he likes from wordless tells, by the speed of his breathing and his grip on her hips. And she knows he likes her mouth, likes to stroke her face when she gets on her knees.

‘Look at me,’ he said, the first time she did it, making sure she looked up as she licked and sucked and swallowed down around him.

She’s found the barest hint of softness beneath the steel shell, and it’s hers alone.

She discovers other things. He really does like cleaning his gun. It’s a ritual he completes alone every morning and every evening, with an intensity she doesn’t pretend to understand.

‘This is the Way,’ he says, simply, when she asks.

In between jobs, he’ll head out alone on borrowed ships, whatever junker Ran has available at the moment, sometimes not returning for days. It might have bothered her, if Xi’an was the jealous type. She’s not, of course. He doesn’t tell her where he goes, and she doesn’t ask. There’s not a lot of talking, generally, when they’re together.

She couldn’t care less what Mando gets up to, as long as he comes back to her.

*

Life is good these days for a woman of her skills and proclivities. Ran’s business is thriving. The underworld is expanding and multiplying across the galaxy, as the Empire grows ever more bloated and corrupt.

She demands a pay raise for herself and her brother, and gets it. Qin immediately spends his extra credits on booze and a truly regrettable night with a pair of slave twins he picked up from Canto Bight. She’s killing herself laughing as she recounts this tale to Mando.

‘I’m surprised he went for the slaves.’

‘That’s your takeaway from this? Not how fucking stupid he is?’

‘That part’s not exactly news.’

‘What, then? You don’t like the bit about the girls? Why should you care about a couple of slaves?’

He’s quiet. Lately he’s been doing that, withdrawing to another dimension in the middle of conversation. Xi’an taps his helmet with her blade, tink-tink, and then catches it at its lower edge, lifting. His hand shoots up and grabs her fingers, crushes so tightly she hears cracking. A bolt of pain consumes her hand – _fucking psycho_ , she hisses – she roils in his grip like a fish in boiling water, grabs her other knife – maybe he won’t be so handsy if she cuts off an appendage, she doesn’t much care which one. But he ends up on top, forcing her arms up over her head, all of his weight on her torso. This wouldn’t be so different from their usual encounters, except she’s spitting with hatred, and there’s no heat, just cold anger in his countenance.

He picks up her dagger from where she dropped it, holds onto it as if undecided.

‘Go ahead, Mando. Cut me.’

Her skin carries a patchwork of pale scars all over. He’s seen them, has run his fingers over them, gently, the only time they’d ever come close to tenderness. She’s borne more pain than he can possibly inflict.

He climbs off of her.

‘We’re done,’ he says. It beats the breath out of her as surely as if he’d used his fists.

*

On the icy plains of Alzoc III, amongst the broken bodies of the fallen enemy, they have their final parting.

Since they stopped fucking, Mando’s gone back to the good old days of studiously ignoring her, and so has Xi’an. Not because she cares what he thinks, but because she won’t let him think it meant anything more than what it was, a diversion. And because she’s a professional. She’ll get the job done as well as any man, even if Ran’s intel on this one was so wrong that he had in effect, sent his crew willingly into a massacre.

She’s wrecked. The base is a smoking ruins around her. Her men are dead or captured. She can feel her bones creaking, the air harsh and acrid in her chest, copper filling her mouth. She can’t quite catch her breath, and there’s bile rising in her throat. She bends, throws up.

‘Easy,’ says Mando, crouching beside her. He holds out one hand. ‘It’s over.’

‘What a gentleman,’ she hisses, wiping her mouth. ‘Get away from me.’

There’s a noise behind them. Xi’an reacts, more from reflex than anything else. Her dagger finds its target, some asshole who has the misfortune of still being alive. He yells, crumples. But her hand was shaking too much. She’s only speared him in the thigh. She gets up, staggers toward the enemy. He’s limp, but breathing, and makes no resistance when she grasps his hair, exposes that soft neck.

Mando grabs her arm. ‘He’s just a boy.’

‘Look around you,’ she says harshly, yanking herself free. ‘Do you think we’re doing him a favour by leaving him alive?’

‘Just let him go.’

‘How many people did you kill today, Mando? What does it matter?’

‘This isn’t the Way.’ There’s a pleading tone in his voice she’s never heard before. She hates it, hates that he could be so weak, that she had ever wanted him. Hates most of all how much she still wants him.

‘This is my way,’ she tells him, and drags her knife through the boy’s throat.


End file.
